This Mad Venture
by panickedfish
Summary: Hatter returns to Alice's world, trailed by a pair of aces who drag him back to Wonderland. Alice travels through the Looking Glass again and teams up with Mad March to rescue him from a new foe. With the assassin as her companion, Alice learns the history behind Hatter's failed rebellion attempt against the Hearts, as well as the shady events leading up to Mad March's first death.
1. David

"Alice come meet David."

Alice walked down the hallway through their converted industrial building apartment towards her mom's voice. She stared down at her hands nervously, unsure of what she would say to the construction worker who found her in the abandoned building. As she walked into the family room, she finally looked up. Her eyes lit up and a huge smile broke out on her face.

"Hatter!" she cried and sprinted the next couple of steps into his arms. He hugged her tightly for a moment. and then held by the shoulders at arm's length to take a good look at her. He seemed to be relieved that she was here, in front of him. Alice couldn't believe it.

"Finally," he whispered.

"I missed you," she breathed.

Then he pulled her in for a kiss and Alice kissed him back, hugging him tightly to her. The thought did cross her mind that this must seem shocking for her mother, but she didn't care. They kissed for a bit longer before Alice's mother managed to form words.

"Um, am I missing something here?" She asked, her eyes searching the pair.

Alice reluctantly opened her eyes and stepped away from Hatter, though he kept holding her hand. Alice gestured to the man.

"Mom this is Ha—David. He's an old friend."

"Nice to meet you," Hatter grinned. He lifted an imaginary hat off his head and did a little curtsey. Alice cringed inwardly, already wondering how his Wonderlandian quirks might make things difficult for her in her own world. But that hardly mattered now. He was here and they were together again—finally indeed.

"Nice to meet you too," Alice's mother stammered. She looked pale. "Well, I guess that's all fine then. Right. Okay. Alice, honey, can I talk to you for a moment?"

Alice reluctantly slipped her hand from Hatter's and followed her mom down the hallway into the den. A quick glance on her shoulder proved that Hatter was already making himself at home—he was sprawled on the couch examining Alice's cell phone that she had left on the coffee table. He appeared delighted at the contraption, holding it in his hands at eye level and examining it from all possible angles. He slid the keyboard.

Alice sighed but she felt some excitement flutter in her chest. Earlier, while in front of the looking glass, Hatter had mentioned pizza. But there was so much else to her world! Gelato and martial arts, public transport and museums. She couldn't wait to show him around her world.

Alice was jarred out of her thoughts by her mom shutting the door to the office behind her.

"Who is he?" she asked. She didn't seem mad, necessarily. Just confused. Alice knew she couldn't blame her.

"He's an old friend, mom. Someone who means a lot to me."

"What about Jack?"

"Jack?" Alice repeated. Of course. _Jack_. She'd be lying if she said she hadn't been thinking of him while she was in the hospital bed while under observation and while waiting for her mother to sign the release forms. She had Jack had shared their laughs and had a good time while dating, but both had gone their separate ways. He had the Duchess, and she had Hatter. Just the thought of him waiting in the living room made her face break out into a grin.

To answer her mom's question, she said quietly: "Jack will always mean something to me too. We're on good terms."

"Well that's a relief." Alice's mom sighed, and then smiled. "Well, have fun then."

"What?" Alice asked, not sure what her mother was getting at.

"You're obviously really happy to be reunited with David. So go out, have fun. Take care though."

"I will," Alice grinned. She skipped to the door of the office and as soon as she opened it she heard a loud ringing—her cell phone at maximum volume.

"Uhh Alice, is it supposed to be doing that?" Hatter's voice came from the living room, his accent more noticeable because of the way his apparent stress made his voice rise in pitch.

Alice smiled to herself and hurried to the living room. Hatter was holding her cell phone as far away from the rest of his body as possible, wincing. The phone was ringing—an obnoxious, old-fashioned sounding ringtone. She gently took it from his hand and shut it off.

Hatter breathed a sigh of relief and stood up. He brushed imaginary lint off his pattered button-up shit. "Right then. Nothing I couldn't handle. Thanks, though."

Alice laughed, and grabbed his hand. She led him to the front door of her apartment, grinning. "Whatever. Let's go out for pizza; I want to show you everything my world has to offer."


	2. Tea

Alice knew just the place to take him. In her particular neighbourhood of the city, there were a number of pizzerias, some were parts of chains but she knew the independent businesses were best. It was past the lunch rush, but she knew where

She took him to Mario's which smelled of warm tomato sauce as soon as they walked in. Alice led him to a booth and they both ordered. While they waited, Alice sipped from her iced tea and watched Hatter's eyes dart around trying to take everything in. He managed to appear relaxed, however, when she looked at him.

"It's good to see you again," he said, extending his hand over the table.

Alice grasped his hand in her own and gave it a gentle squeeze. "It's good to see you again too." The two were silent for a few more moments, and then their pizza arrived.

As they ate, Alice told Hatter more about her world. He seemed interested in cars, though there was a crestfallen expression when he learned that there were no such things as flying flamingos. "Not that I would want to drive one again," he said hastily and Alice remembered their flight from the rooftop of the Happy Hearts Casino.

Sometimes when she thought about her time in wonderland it seemed more like a distant dream than anything else. Was it a memory? But Hatter, in front of her, was all the proof she needed. She smiled at him and his lips quirked in response.

Once they finished eating, Hatter leaned back. He watched Alice sip her iced tea. Noticing this, Alice stopped.

"Do you want to go for tea?" she asked teasingly.

"Very much so," Hatter admitted.

Alice paid the bill (Hatter of course, had no use for paper money) and the two headed up the street. The late afternoon sun glinted off buildings and while she walked arm in arm with him, their bodies side by side. She talked about the modern conveniences of her world in an undertone and mentioned as many of the cool spaces of her city as she could ramble off. She could tell that Hatter was really enjoying this and it made her happy to see him take such an interest in her world.

"Well we're here," she said, stopping in front of a small corner tea shop. She opened the door and stepped inside. A small bell tinkled above them and the smell of exotic green, black, and herbal loose-leaf teas wafted towards them. Alice let the door shut behind them and took a seat at the bar.

Hatter whistled as he sat next to her. He studied the wall-to-wall shelf full of tins behind the counter and nodded. "This is good."

"This is very good," Alice said with a smile. She ordered her favourite, a relatively low-key honey lemon blueberry herbal tea. Hatter muttered under his breath "is there no confidence?" but then caught Alice's eye and smiled. He addressed the only shopkeeper and asked for English Breakfast.

The employee nodded and started to make their orders. Alice laid out her money on the counter.

Hatter picked up one of the coins and examined the figurehead on the back. "Huh. So that's how you people do it."

"When you compare our system to a tea stock market..." she started, taking the money away from him.

"Nonsense" Hatter whispered. He flicked the coin in the air and played with it in his hands. Then he brought his hands apart to show that it had disappeared, a mischievous glint to his eye. Alice let him have his fun but was nevertheless delighted when the tea shop owner brought them their teas and she lifted her cup to find the coin on the saucer, the queen-side up.

"How did you? Never mind," she said. She and Hatter clinked their cups together softly and then sipped their tea.

Suddenly, there was a commotion coming from the back of the tea shop.

"What the hell—" the shop keeper grumbled. He walked towards the source of the sound but was blown back by a sudden blast. Alice fell from her stool and hit the worn hardwood floor hard. A little stunned from the jarring violence of hitting her head against the side of the bar on the way down, her eyesight blurred and she felt the steady pressure of Hatter's body against hers as he protected her from the flying debris. Tin cans of tea fell over and bounced off his shoulders while their teacups and saucers shattered overhead.

Alice looked to Hatter. His moth was moving but she couldn't tell what he was saying. Her ears rang and she felt dizzy. Then, suddenly, the feeling of closeness to Hatter vanished. All she felt was empty space above her as she cried out when shards of glass pricked her skin.

She rolled over, collecting bruises and stammered to her feet. Blinking the cloud of smoke out of her eyes, she saw what appeared to be two Aces grabbing Hatter and hauling him out of the tea shop through the back door. His lip was cut and there was desperation in his eyes.

"Alice don't" she thought she saw his lips move and spell out those two words. As she tried to reach for him, though, she tripped over the unconscious body of the tea shop owner.

"Hatter!" she screamed. They had just been reunited; she didn't want to lose him again. But there was nothing she could do. The man on the floor needed medical attention. Just then he stirred, and coughed. Alice shoved her cellphone into his hand.

"Call an ambulance," she instructed, her hands fluttering over him. He didn't seem to have sustained any serious injuries but it was difficult to tell. His symptoms might be masked by shock. Alice herself was stunned by what had just happened but she didn't have time to sort through the debris in her foggy mind caused by the explosion. She had lost three people to Wonderland already—her father, Jack, and Hatter, but this man was the only one who had managed to make it back with her. She would not lose him again. Alice dialled the emergency number, left the phone with the tea shop owner, and then ran out the back door, her heavy boots clunking against the sidewalk and a searing ache in her chest as she breathed deeply, forcing her muscles to propel her through the shadows.


	3. Mirror

It was like being able to experience the same nightmare all over again. Alice ran in the direction of the sounds of struggle, venturing deeper into the back alleys of her city. They were quite a few blocks from where the looking glass was last time, when she had run after Jack, but when she turned the corner and Hatter was dragged out of sight there it was; the same incandescent swirling mixture of fog set inside a large rectangle of gilded starlight. This time, instead of stopping up short and stumbling into the depths of the mirror, Alice took a deep breath and ran headlong into it, only shutting her eyes at the last moment.

She realized instantly that sprinting through the portal had been a mistake. She tumbled through the fog much faster than she had last time, her arms flailing and losing all sense of direction. When she did finally land (rather hard and face-first) on the ground, she remained immobile for a couple of beats, trying to catch her breath. She practiced opening and closing her eyes and inhaled the sweet scent of moist dirt. Grass tickled her cheek.

Alice took a deep breath and sat up, not wanting to lose too much time. When her eyes finally focused on the scene in front of her, though, it was all she could do not to panic and shut them again.

On her most recent journey to Wonderland, she had followed a hallway carpeted with authentic green grass but this time there was no hallway. All Alice saw as she looked from the space she had landed was emptiness. That was strange. She could have sworn she felt the same grassy texture as when she first visited wonderland.

She stood up unsteadily, wishing that there was a wall she could hold on to. Her feet found something flat to stand on, but there was no floor she could see. Losing all sense of direction and struck with an extreme sense of vertigo, Alice fought back tears. She was already terrified of this place and wondered if this could even _be _wonderland—it was nothing like the place she remembered.

A fog steadily spilled from an invisible opening above her and cascaded down and around her body. It was the same material as the portal of the mirror.

"Welcome... to the pool of tears," a throaty voice said.

Alice quickly looked around and strained her eyes but was unable to perceive the direction from which the voice was coming. She felt as though she was in Drs. Dee and Dum's interrogation room again. The panic continued to built within her and some of it escaped in the form of her voice cracking as she answered the voice with a question of her own:

"Who's there?"

The voice made a strange, guttural and choking noise which Alice incredulously concluded to be a laugh. This _thing_, whatever it was, seemed to think she was funny. Alice was not in the mood to entertain.

"That is not the right question to ask. What you really want to know the answer to is: why are you here?" the voice sounded flat; but how could Alice have expected an echo when there were no walls in the space?

"Please, I only wanted to go to Wonderland. I went through the Looking Glass and everything. How did I end up here? What is this place? Where am I?"

"Again, all the wrong questions...the emphasis is to be placed on _why_..." the voice intoned.

"Who are you?" Alice retorted. She needed to get a rise out of this creature to see that it was something she could fight. Her martial arts training wouldn't help against a ghostly foe.

"I am but a Figment, my dear. I am only as real as you make me."

A cat formed out of the haze and skittered towards Alice. She instinctively bent down to stroke its head, feeling the strong neck muscles and the curvature of the skull.

"Dinah!" she exclaimed.

The cat looked at her with pleading eyes and rubbed its face against her knee, purring loudly. Then Alice blinked and the cat was gone. In its place was a small sapling which instantly died, withered, and crumbled to dust. Alice recoiled.

"You ran too far..." the voice said. The tone had dropped significantly, adding a sinister layer to its broad proclamations. Alice stumbled backwards, but the voice was all around her; she couldn't escape. Alice shut her eyes, feeling tears seep through her eyelashes. Why this? Why her? She took one more step back but there was no invisible force to hold her weight. She lost her balance and fell back, screaming as she went.


End file.
